Slowly, I opened my eyes again.
Light.
I rubbed my eyes, that were now soaked from tears.
Then with a sigh, I sat up from my bed and walked out into the living room.
I have been living by myself since I got 1st year university. Yes, as you may all have guessed, Riga is not my real name. My real full name is Raymond Dong. Yes, I am Chinese. And my family and I are immigrants and came to here Vancouver, Canada nearly a decade ago. Except by the time I started first year university, my family moved back to China again, and I was living alone in an apartment near the University campus. 2 semesters into the year, I have already failed 2 courses out of 6 and I had to retake one of them. And the only thing that was more non-existent then my grades was my social life. Despite living here for nearly a decade, I never really adapted to any of that white kids stuff, neither did I blend in with the true Asians as well. And by that I mean, the rich Asian kids driving around in the Lamborghini their parents brought them, dress in ridiculously expensive Korean designer clothes and look like total fukboi, or watching movies together...(Ok, the last one is really out of envy now).
Feeling the need for a refreshment, I walked over to the fridge to grab a coke, and just as I swing the fridge door open, my cell-phone in my bed room rang. With a groan, I walked back and picked it up.
It was mom.
The rest of the conversation was in Chinese and it basically went like this:
Mom: "Raymond, I need to talk to you about something."
Me: "Yes, what is it mom?"
Mom: "How are your grades now? Have you gotten A yet?"
Me: "Mom, I am trying. I am almost getting that B..."
Mom: "B? You disappoint the whole family, we pay so much for your university and this is how your repay us?"
Me: "Mom please, can we talk about this another time?"
Mom: "No. And me and your dad have just talked over this. And we decided..."
Me: "Decide what?"
Mom: "We decided that if you can't get A by the end of the semester, we will stop paying for your tuition and rent. And you will be on your own."
Me: "What!? But..."
Mom: "Your 18 and you still haven't decided on what you want to do in the future! Do you want to be doctor? Do you want to be lawyer? Or do you want to be family disgrace!?"
Me: "Mom..."
Mom: "Too bad that is just how life is! What you are enduring right now is nothing compared to what we endured during childhood! Back then, we only have computers and really crappy cellphones! Now you have this...gaming device..."
Me: "You mean 'CROWN' the VR headset..."
Mom: "I don't care! That thing has ruined your life! And buying you it was our biggest mistake!"
Me: "Ok, fine I get it. I am going to hang up now. We can talk about this a later time."
Mom: "Don't you dare hang up on me! Your father and I-"
I hanged up, and fell back onto my bed again.
Fk.
I raised my right fist and curled it up.
If that thing never happened...
I looked up and stared at my prosthetic robotic arm.
I smashed my fist against the bed, and took in a deep breath, then let it out again like an over-inflated balloon.
"Master? Are you alright?" came a voice from my fake arm. Slowly, I turned my head to face it;
"No, Enju I am not." I said with a shakily breath.
Enju was my personal assistant AI that came with my fake arm, except I later downloaded a mod and customised the voice and appearance of it. In her blue holographic form, she was about figure size and was projected from the back of my wrist.
She appeared to be around in 16, but of course, with the case of AI you can never really tell. She has a twin blue dashing ponytail, crystal blue eyes, and her clothing at that time was set to snow witch.
"What happened?" she asked tentatively.
"Nothing. I don't want to talk about it."
"Is there anything Enju can do to make master happy?"
"Just leave me alone." I said rashly, then rolled to my side and muttered: "Stupid ass game..."
Stu-tupid-aass ga-mee...
Stupi-pid...aa...
Stu...
...
Q: How would your parents respond if you got a bad grade?